If the go-go 1990s, with its fast money and flush credit seeking rapid and steep returns, created the demand for "renaissance" Chief Financial Officers ("CFO"), who could manage (and market) both the strategic and financial operations of the enterprise, the more sobering decade that followed led directly to the creation and subsequent rise of the Chief Procurement Officer ("CPO"), who could reduce costs, build internal relationships, and develop strategic suppliers efficiently and effectively.

In today's highly-competitive markets, more and more procurement and sourcing professionals are looking to streamline processes and drive superior performance. In the quest for higher savings, more spend under management and increased compliance, sourcing executives must turn to their own repository of spend data to effectively identify opportunities for savings and gain a deeper understanding of their corporate spend.

The global recession is taking no prisoners. Neither industry, nor region, nor company-size has provided shelter from its impact. Within the enterprise, few business functions have been unaffected. Yet, as this business downturn continues, the Chief Procurement Officer's ("CPO") agenda and the CEO's agenda have started to converge.

The strategic sourcing group has faced myriad challenges over the last two decades, including a fluctuating economy and increased expectations to bolster the enterprise bottom-line. However, the last few years have brought about a new, complex challenge: continue to drive procurement performance while finding fresh cost savings within other areas of corporate spending.

In the past decade, procurement and finance executives have become generally aware of the potential impact of supplier insolvencies, supply disruptions, commodity pricing volatility and the impact that these-not to mention a range of other dangers lurking within their supply chain can have on their business.

Spend analysis has gradually become the top process in the procurement executive's toolbox, placing itself in the top tier of functionalities alongside e-sourcing, e-procurement and strategic sourcing solutions.

Spend Matters research has long considered Hackett Group metrics to be the gold standard of P2P benchmarking. As part of the collaboration for the research for this report, Hackett agreed to share with Spend Matters some of the findings from its latest P2P benchmarks.

Spend Matters has long argued that spend visibility and contract management have always been two sides of the same coin. Companies can leverage an integrated spend analysis, contract management and P2P solution set to institute real-time controls to validate a number of possible spend variables.

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